the inklings of tori frost

Life

June hasn’t been an easy month, suffice it to say. Processing tragedy after tragedy — from the huge to the personal — takes a psychological toll, and I’ve been scraping the bottom of the spoons barrel to have enough focus for work and my fiction writing.

Consequently, I haven’t been reading much. That isn’t to say that there aren’t a lot of fantastic new books out there to read! I may try to write quick, “here are my first impressions and what I’ve heard about this title” reviews for a few new titles to keep things going, but more in-depth reviews are on hold until I get my head back in the game.

Though, speaking of which, I’ve made significant progress on a fiction project that I’d told myself I just wasn’t ready to write, so there’s that. Ten years of false starts and personal growth may yet get me somewhere.

I have to apologize again for the lack of content. There are a few reasons: most of what I’ve been reading lately are ARCs for upcoming titles, not a lot of books have inspired me enough to review them one way or another, I’ve been picking up extra shifts at work, and — most dramatically — I just spent the weekend stuck in a hotel because of a fire in my apartment building!

This is fine.

Pro tip: if you’re running out the door, leave it open. The firefighters can and will break it down if you don’t.

As of today, I am back home and getting settled. No one was hurt and the damage to the building was minor, so they let us back fairly quickly. I’m exhausted. A cleaning crew of angels scrubbed the entire place while I was gone, so fortunately all I have left to do is laundry, but my altered sleep schedule and the anxiety of having been almost literally set on fire have been draining.

Everyone has been so supportive and kind, though, and that warms my heart. I couldn’t ask for better coworkers and friends.

However, I do have some things planned! May is a big month for book releases and I have several reviews already queued up. I’m planning a write-up of a few late April titles, too (The Lie Tree, mainly) and soon I’ll have my hands on a copy of the much-anticipated conclusion to Maggie Stiefvater’s hit Raven Cycle series, The Raven King.

It’s been about three weeks since my last post, but I’m still here and still writing. I’ve been reading a lot of ARCs (advanced reader copies) for titles that come out in May and June, so I have several reviews written and queued up to be published the week of the official releases.

A teaser of what’s to come:

Outrun the Moon by Stacey Lee, a historical YA drama set in San Francisco during the 1906 earthquake.

You Know Me Well by Nina LaCour and David Levithan, a charming coming-of-age novella that follows two gay teens through heartbreak and self-discovery during Pride Week.

Doreen by Ilana Manaster, a modern gender-swapped retelling of The Picture of Dorian Gray set at an exclusive New England boarding school.

After a decade on the web, I’ve had a lot of social media platforms to shout from: Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, various teenage blogs with bad early-2000s aesthetics, etc. Now, after a year as a bookseller and with a lot of book reviews, opinion pieces, and anxious mumbling about my own projects cresting on the horizon, I’d like to strike out in a more professional direction.

This is now my Real Adult With Career hub. I intend to post book reviews and reading round-ups on a semi-regular basis. I’ll be reviewing both published works and upcoming titles (all spoiler-free), with a special focus on LGBT+ and diverse fiction for children and young adults — and, of course, fantasy and science-fiction for all ages, because I am a woman of simple tastes.

You can find out a bit more about me on my About page, if you’re curious about who I am and why on earth you should trust my opinions on anything.